College Park, Winter Park home prices soar

College Park, Winter Park home prices soar

Prices rise more than $100K above the city average.

COLLEGE PARK — The story of Orlando’s housing market today is pretty straightforward: the inventory of available homes is thin, while prices are rising, and fast.

That’s particularly true in the College Park neighborhood, where the existing-home median price is more than $100.000 above the median price for the entire city -- but where there are fewer homes on the market today than a year ago, and fewer sales being made.

The Orlando Regional Realtors Association just issued its latest report on the state of the city’s housing market, noting that low inventory was boosting home prices throughout the city. The existing-home median price in Orlando was $153,000 in June, the first time prices have gone above $150,000 since December 2008.

The city’s median price was up by 22 percent compared to June 2012, and 5.4 percent higher than in May 2013.

“Just to reflect on the median price of $153,000, it was just a year ago in June 2012 that we were pleased it had gotten up to $125,000,” said Steve Merchant, chairman of ORRA and the broker-owner of Global Realty International. “Look at how far we’ve come in a year.”

But if prices are rising steadily in Orlando, the College Park neighborhood’s housing market could almost be considered on fire, Merchant said.

An analysis by ORRA of the 32804 zip code, which makes up College Park, showed that the median price there a year ago was well above the city average, at $174,500. Last month, though, the median price in College Park had skyrocketed to $255,000, or $102,000 more than in the city as a whole.

That, Merchant said, is a sign of a neighborhood with a solid appeal to buyers, and it demonstrates what Realtors have said for a long time about location, location, location.

“I think there is a high demand for living downtown in general, and close to downtown,” Merchant said. “I think the great demand in College Park is reflective of that.”

Margaret Barnes, a Realtor with Old Town Brokers in Orlando, agreed, saying College Park’s housing market was never as hard hit as other parts of the city.

“I think it never went as far down as the rest of Greater Orlando,” Barnes said. “The neighborhood in general has always been a good draw for families. Downtown is not necessarily for everyone, and education is also a draw there -- the schools in College Park being very good.”

In June, the median price in College Park was up 46.1 percent from June 2012 -- a near-doubling of the cost of a home there.

“It’s always been a very family-oriented neighborhood,” Barnes said.

But while prices are heading up, sales, new contracts and new listings are all down in the neighborhood – a sign of an increased reluctance on the part of sellers to get back into the market.

Sales were down 22 percent in College Park in June compared to a year ago, and new contracts for sales dropped by 7 percent. Merchant noted that there are 7.8 percent fewer new listings in College Park compared to this time last year.

“There are not many listings right now,” Merchant said. “We are low in inventory throughout the whole (Orlando) market.”

Barnes said the low inventory in College Park is no surprise.

“It’s a very, very stable neighborhood,” she said. “That’s one reason there are so few listings.”

Buyers attracted to College Park, she said, need to be patient – and be ready to move fast when a home does get listed there.

“If they are really wanting to buy there, they need to keep after it and keep trying,” she said. “You may have to buy something that might not meet all your demands.”

College Park Realtor Ann Rogers said the neighborhood has been attractive to buyers for a while.

"Most of my experience is in College Park, and for 26 years I’ve been in real estate here, and it continues to be a desirable place to live," Rogers said. "The inventory is really what's driving the price up – the lack of it. There are 87 active listings in College Park, and that seems very low."

The neighborhood, though, remains appealing to both first time buyers -- and to builders, she added.

"There's a lot of people who grew up in College Park who came back to College Park because it feels like a neighborhood," Rogers said. "There has been some new building in College Park. There is quite a bit of that happening, and renovations as well."

College Park is not the only part of Metro Orlando experiencing an escalation in home prices. In Winter Park, the median price was $148,750 in June 2012, but soared by 37.8 percent within a year to $205,000 this past June.

Unlike in College Park, though, sales, new contracts and even new listings are up compared to a year ago. Sales in Winter Park have risen 5 percent in the last year, new contracts increased 1.8 percent, and new listings rose by 5.5 percent.